Birthday Girl
by RochelleRene
Summary: So many of you requested the complement to Birthday Boy, so here it is.


**So, this fic is a little different. It just veers off the more predictable narrative path and is instead of a series of vignettes that come together in different ways, rather than the usual set-up, conflict, climax (pardon the pun), resolution formula.**

**I've always longed for the fly-on-the-wall perspective on House and Cuddy, wanted to eavesdrop on what their life as a couple would be like. IMHO, it wouldn't just be dramatic fight after dramatic fight. I will always believe there was a comfort there. A true love and deep intimacy. So this fic offers glimpses of the everyday interactions of the two. They aren't totally random peeks into their lives - I chose the scenes to explore a theme about Cuddy, leading to an eventual birthday gift. But the thing is, thoughtfulness between lovers doesn't happen just in the two weeks before a birthday. It is there in small observances and deep understandings of each other. That's what I was trying to show between these two.**

**I'm nervous because I hope it "works." I mean, I hope it's still fun to read. Many thanks to maya295_ whose review of "Birthday Boy" gave me the courage to try something a little unpredictable.**

**And many thanks to my abusive muse oc7ober for demanding a Cuddy birthday fic immediately after reviewing the House birthday fic. May you never be sated, you merciless beotch!**

**I also want to apologize to vicpei1 and any other physicians out there for any horrible medical misunderstandings. I do my best with the internet and a series of language arts/social science degrees. LOL.**

**Okay, I'll shut up now.**

[H] [H] [H]

Cuddy was drunk.

She and House were walking back to the car after an evening out at a blues club and between his limp and her leaning into him to stabilize her wobbly walk, they were a bit of a sidewalk hazard. A guy coming their way veered way out of their path. House nodded cordially at him. "Thanks. We're training. Three-legged race in the Special Olympics."

House was amused by her cheerful motor-mouth tendencies when tipsy. Walking through the college town had turned her all nostalgic. They walked by a pizza place. "Do you remember that pizza place in Ann Arbor, on Liberty? The Lamplighter? They had a Sicilian pizza there that was soooooo goooooood," she told him, as if this was vital information.

"Yeah, I remember that place. They were open really late. Like, 4am."

"Yes!" she exclaimed, delighted her remembered.

"If you went to a show at the State, it was either there or Tio's afterwards. Both open. Always."

"Oooh yeah. Tio's. They had the…"

"Best shakes," they said in unison.

They teetered along. They passed a University central office building, the entrance flanked by two stone lions. "Remember that legend, that if you stepped on the block M in the diag, you'd flunk your first midterms? To break the curse you had to run naked from the museum lions to the M at midnight, before the twelve gongs were over."

"I vaguely remember that," House said, thinking back to the layout of the campus and wondering if that run was even possible in that amount of time. "Us big-time grad students were above such nonsense, though." They continued in silence for a moment. "Wait, why do you remember it?" he teased.

Cuddy made a silly_ I-have-a-secret_ face and said nothing.

"_I _was your first midterms," he scolded. "I mean, I was your TA for one." Cuddy laughed. "Cuddy, you coulda had a lot more fun getting naked to pass that midterm," he teased. She swatted him.

"I passed without prostituting myself, thank you very much."

More quiet walking. Then House sighed, "Man, I wish I would have been notified you were gonna do that run."

"Oh get over it. You see me naked plenty now."

"Naked, yeah. But I'm not talking just the sexual gratification. Seeing you run stark naked across campus in less than a minute would have been hilarious!" He laughed. "Did you have to run over that big bridge?"

"No it's after the bridge."

"Oh... Still." He chuckled.

"Sorry you had to wait - what was it? - two semesters for a look at my bodacious college bod." Cuddy stopped and did a goofily buzzed little shimmy, which House was happy to appraise. He grabbed her ass and pulled her close.

"You're bodacious-er now." They kissed and Cuddy's view tipped upward as he kissed her neck.

"Oh, look, House, that apartment above Small World is for sale." House looked above Cuddy's favorite coffee shop to a window with a _for sale_ sign posted in it. "I always wanted to live in one of those cute apartments above a café," she sighed. They started walking again. "Can you imagine waking up to the smell of coffee brewing and pastries baking? And looking out your window and everyone is bustling around even if you're all cozy upstairs? It's so romantic."

"I guess, if you like living in 250 square feet," House groused.

"They aren't _that _small. And anyway that's what's so great… This little spot amidst all the bustle that's all your own. I remember looking at one like that above Cava Java in college. You remember that place, South University?"

House nodded. "I think it's a tanning salon now."

Cuddy ignored this downer news. "It was sooooo cuuuuute. And I never should have looked at it because I fell in love and knew I couldn't afford the rent. I ended up living with five other girls in one of those huge houses they had gutted and turned the closets into tiny bedrooms."

"Yeah, none of those houses were to code," he remembered. "My housemate got a kidney stone and they called an ambulance and they couldn't even get the stretcher up the stairs."

"Why'd they call an ambulance for a stone?"

"They thought his appendix burst. I kept telling those morons it was a stone, but do people ever listen to me, Cuddy?" He made a fake sad face.

"Poor House," Cuddy teased, patting his cheek and making them stumble further.

"Poor me. That's why I sing the blues."

Cuddy snorted. "Yeah, cuz losing your girl to a Mississippi flood feels a lot like getting asked for a second opinion."

"Similar plight, Cuddy," he laughed. "They understand my pain." He nudged her. "Wanna make me feel better?"

They continued to the car, reminiscing, laughing, in love.

[H] [H] [H]

House burst into Cuddy's office, ready for a fight about the procedure he wanted to do, but she was nowhere to be seen. He walked back out to her assistant. "Where's Cuddy?" he growled.

Her assistant, who was terrified of House, looked up at him, well, terrified. "Uh, she's in her office as far as I know…" he stammered.

"That's funny," House replied. "I was just in her office. Then I came out here. And asked you where she is. Which might lead you to deduce…" He made a hand gesture for the guy to get with it.

"I haven't seen her leave!" he protested.

"Alright, alright, settle down," House scolded. "I'll go check with the _secret_ assistant outside her _secret_ office." The guy actually looked a little worried about that notion.

House walked back into her office. He saw that her bathroom door was closed, but the light was on. He gave a sharp knock. "I wanna remove her eye," he bellowed.

There was a beat of silence, then, "There is no justifiable need to remove the eye unless you have found an actual tumor that wasn't there three hours ago."

"No justifiable legal ass-covering, you mean," he yelled back. "There _is_ need. It's a microtumor causing her eye to throw clots right into her brain. "

"Convenient, House," Cuddy called through the door, "Seeing as you aren't able to show any actual proof of a microtumor."

"Not convenient for her. She's the one having multiple strokes."

He heard her sigh through the door. "You can come in," she told him.

House opened the door. Cuddy was sitting on a stack of towels in the space between the toilet and the wall. Her shoes and jacket were tossed aside and she had a book open on her lap.

"What are you doing?" he asked.

"I'm taking a break," she answered.

"You don't take breaks."

"That you know about."

"Why not?"

"Cuz you'd just wanna _fill my prescription_ or _scan my cat_ or some other clever medical euphemism for nailin' me."

House chuckled. "I'm even funny when you're me." She gave him an icy stare. "It's a retinoblastoma. It's just too small to see yet. More of a retino-pretty decent time-oma."

"Is there any tenderness or swelling?"

"See, that's the whole thing about _micro _tumors…"

"Get me an image, some evidence of vision distortion, or some blood indicators of cancer. Until then, you're not removing the poor woman's eye on a hunch."

"My hunches are usually right," he protested.

"Your hunches that have at least enough evidence for me to approve pursuing them are usually right," she corrected. "The batting average of your run-of-the-mill hunch is much lower."

"I'll accept this only because you used a sports metaphor."

"You'll accept it because I'm your boss."

"I prefer the term 'coach.'"

"Go away, House," Cuddy ordered, picking her book back up.

He looked at her, leaning against the tile with her legs stretched out in front of her. "You sure you don't want me to give you a _triple-X ray?_" Cuddy pointed at the door. House laughed. "Okay, okay," but he turned back before shutting the door, sticking his head back in. "How come I get in trouble when I take breaks in the clinic?" he asked.

Cuddy didn't look up from her book. "Because you do the exact opposite of running a hospital," she explained.

He looked at her, reading her book next to a toilet just to get ten minutes of peace, and shut the door.

[H] [H] [H]

Cuddy came upstairs dripping sweat after pounding the treadmill. The sun was just coming up and in the dim kitchen light she grabbed a glass and went to the freezer to get some ice. She filled her glass and took an ice cube and ran it over her sweaty face, down and around her neck. Then she popped it in her mouth.

Suddenly, she heard a lustful groan from the kitchen table and yelped with a startle, spitting the ice cube out.

"Jesus, House," she laughed, holding her hand to her heart, "I thought you were still in bed."

"How have I never seen you do that?" he said, holding the paper and a cup of coffee, but looking physically pained.

She laughed again. "Because, you're usually still in bed."

"Do it again," he requested. Cuddy sat in the chair next to him and propped her legs on his lap, carefully placing them to avoid direct pressure on his scar.

"Take my shoes off, I'm tired."

"Rub yourself with an ice cube," he countered.

She laughed and did so while he fumbled with her laces because he was not looking at the shoes at all. Her shoes plunked to the floor.

"Want me to take anything else off?" he asked.

"Want me to rub anything else with an ice cube?" she teased back.

There was that small moment when they would just smirk at each other, head-to-head in a battle of witty comments. He looked at her taut body, covered in a sheen of sweat. She looked at his sleepy eyes and bed-head hair. Then the simultaneous giving in when House pulled her arm and Cuddy stood up and dropped into his lap. They kissed. He licked her chin.

"I'm hot and disgusting," she said.

He shook his head. "I've always liked my babes roasted and salted." He licked down her neck and snaked his hands up her tank top. "And to think I've been wasting time sleeping all these mornings."

Cuddy put her hands in his hair and arched back as he began lifting her top. A small moan escaped her lips at the precise moment that they heard the muffled thud. Pause. Wait for it. _Pat-pat-pat-pat-pat_. Cuddy leaped out of House's lap before Rachel could make it to the kitchen. She laughed as he grimaced and adjusted himself, then gave a heavy sigh. "Hold that thought for, oh, fourteen hours," she told him.

"Mama, I'm a dragonfly!" Rachel announced when she appeared in the kitchen doorway.

"You are? How great! You are the most beautiful dragonfly I have ever seen!"

"I want you to make me a dragonfly with the Play-Doh!"

"You know, that's so funny," Cuddy said, reaching into the basket that held the Play-Doh. "That is exactly what I wanted to do!" She winked at House and started rolling out dragonfly parts.

He watched her change from horny girlfriend to doting mother like a light switch, and wondered how the hell she managed it.

[H] [H] [H]

House came into Cuddy's office toting lattes and a sack from Small World café.

Cuddy was on the phone but mouthed, "Ooooooh. Thank you," to him, sipping her drink immediately.

He sat on her couch and rifled through the files there, looking for anything the moron doctors might have missed. When she hung up she turned to him.

"So nice of you," she observed. "What did you do wrong?"

"Nothing yet. It's a premature making amends for my next screw-up. Remember it." One file had caught his attention a little and he was reading more.

Cuddy dug into the pink pastry bag. "Mmm. What flavor?" she asked, referring to the croissant.

House looked up. "What flavor would you have picked?" he asked. "After your ten minutes of careful deliberating."

"I can never decide," she admitted, biting into it. Raspberry. "You know what I'd like to do one day?" she said through her bite. She swallowed. "I want to order all six flavors and just take one bite out of each."

"Yeah, that's on my bucket list too," House said, absent-mindedly. "I'm taking _really drunk football fan_," he informed her rising with the file and walking to the door.

"Why?" she asked through another bite.

"He's got ALS."

"Can't sleep _that _off," Cuddy joked, but she looked a little sad. He wanted to reassure her for some reason, even though he knew she'd probably forget about the guy in five minutes.

"Maybe I'm wrong," he offered.

She gave a small smile as she picked up her phone again. "Let's hope so." And for a second, she really did hope for the guy. She still cared about all of them, at least a little. House wished he ever had.

[H] [H] [H]

On her birthday, House and Cuddy had lunch with her sister, her sister's husband, and her mother at a restaurant near the hospital. Cuddy opened gifts – a sweater, a purse, her favorite lipstick – and cooed over each item. House had bought her a necklace and she put it on immediately. "It's nice, House," Julia commented. "You have good taste."

"That's not all she's getting, if you know what I mean," he predictably clowned, provoking eye rolls, protests to shut up, and a dirty look from Cuddy. He loved how easily ruffled they still were. It was like standing by a pond holding a pebble. He could never resist.

After lunch he and Cuddy were walking the few blocks back to the hospital and passing Cuddy's café. House convinced her they had time to go in and grab dessert. "It's your birthday. The hospital will function fine for another half hour." She relented. As they got closer, House commented on the apartment above still being for sale.

"Let's just call and see it," he said, dialing the number on the sign as they walked in. "Just for fun."

"What's the point, House? So I can fall in love with a romantic notion?"

He looked in her eyes. "Yes."

Cuddy ordered as he spoke on the phone and it turned out the realtor was in the neighborhood and could pop in and take them up. House smiled at her.

"This is stupid," she said.

"It's fun. Maybe I can lose the realtor and we can do it up there."

She ignored him. The barista, who couldn't have been more than sixteen, brought them their drinks and a piece of cake to share. House handed her some money and as she gave him change she smiled at him, clearly smitten, and said, "Thank you, Dr. House."

Cuddy looked up at the girl dreamily smiling at House, and as they walked to a table she half-whispered, "I think she likes you."

House laughed. "Who doesn't? That reminds me. I meant to tell you that I need tomorrow off. I'm being photographed for a spread in Tiger Beat." They sat.

"How does she know your name?"

House shrugged. "Who knows? Credit card. When I come here after the strip club I have to charge it cuz all my cash has been G-strung."

"I always like a nice espresso after the strip club too," Cuddy teased back.

They ate and chatted for a few minutes. Then the realtor entered the coffee shop and walked right up to House, shaking his hand with gusto. "Let's go take a look-sie, shall we?" he asked them both, beckoning them with a sweep of his arm.

With the realtor leading the way, keys in hand, they left the coffee shop and went through the door next to it, climbing a flight of stairs to a small landing with another door at the top. The realtor handed the key to Cuddy. "Why don't you do the honors?" he asked. Cuddy looked a little confused, but unlocked the door. She opened it and went on in, looking around.

"There's still someone living here?" she asked. The apartment was fully furnished, and beautiful. Clearly a woman lived here. Cuddy began wandering around a little. There were tall bookshelves full of books – her favorite authors, in fact. There were candles, beautiful photography, and cushy pillowed furniture. She saw a treadmill and a whole assortment of yoga accessories in one corner. Cuddy found herself touching things – picking up knick-knacks, running her hands over curtains.

She turned back to House, who was leaning in the doorway, alone, smiling at her.

"What?" she asked. He didn't say anything. "What?"

"You like it?"

"Yeah, of course. It's weird, it's like my twin lives here."

"Or like you live here," he said quietly. Cuddy stopped her meandering walk around the small apartment.

"House."

"Happy birthday, Cuddy."

She shook her head, blinked. "What do you mean, House?"

He shrugged a little. "It's yours. For whenever, however you want."

"What do you mean?"

"It's your spot. You deserve to have a spot that isn't between a wall and a toilet."

"House, this is crazy."

"Why? You're right, you can't live here. But why should that stop you from having something you always wanted? The fantasy."

Cuddy began noticing even more now. Magazines she loved, her perfume, snacks she liked in the kitchen. She couldn't speak.

"It's too much," she finally said. "It's too much money."

House laughed. "Cuddy what do I make six figures for? To buy a new guitar? I'm happy when you're happy… Anyway, I'm gonna ask my boss for a raise this year."

She stood in the middle of the large room, stunned. "Thank you," she whispered, choked up. House just grinned, nodded. "Come here," she beckoned, holding her arms out.

House shook his head. "Nope."

"What do you mean? Why?"

"It's just yours. It's not to be tainted by anyone else. It's something just yours," he explained. "I'm never coming in there unless I think you've downward dogged yourself to death."

"But it's fine. I want you here."

"You can have me anywhere else," he replied. "Really. I'll get naked out here on the landing. But not in there."

Cuddy beamed at him and he had to bite his cheek to keep from beaming back too much and betraying his cool exterior.

"I'm gonna go get more coffee. Take your time," he said, turning and heading down the stairs.

Cuddy roamed around the small apartment. A desk had jars of every pen style and color she could want. There were blank journals of various sizes, spines, and styles. The medicine cabinet had four different toothpastes. House had left little notes all over. She opened a drawer full of mismatched silverware containing a note that read, "Which one do you want to eat with today, Cuddy?" A note in the fridge full of her favorite drinks (and even stuff she never drank) read, "What do you want to drink today, Cuddy?" A note with a simple smiley face was on the freezer door. She opened it and found it full to the brim with ice cube trays. A disposable camera sat in the midst of them with a note on it. "All I ask, is that you take the occasional photo."

She laughed in the silence. And her laugh was the only sound she heard. It was total peace.

[H] [H] [H]

"You tell me, birthday girl," he said, pulling her close suddenly with one arm. It was later, the night of her birthday. Julia had taken Rachel and Cuddy and House had gone to dinner and a movie and were now standing in her bedroom, a pair of handcuffs dangling from House's hand. "What do you want? Unfettered power or complete surrender?"

Their faces were close. She looked in his eyes, those eyes she knew so well, sparkling with ideas. She thought about his question.

"I want both," she laughed.

"We got all night." He kissed her, tasting her, then opening more to slide his tongue between her lips. Cuddy leaned into him, pressing her hands against his chest, pushing him toward the bed. Now he knew how to start at any rate. He closed one shackle around his own wrist with an intoxicatingly erotic _click. _He kept kissing her slowly, following her gentle pushing to the bed. He flopped down on his back with a wicked grin while Cuddy crawled on top of him. She grabbed his other arm, wove the handcuffs through the bedposts, and trapped him. House saw a glazed look come over Cuddy, the look of power, and he was so turned on it was ridiculous. It was one thing to play these games in fleeting, symbolic sorts of ways - a drunken night with an old girlfriend, a role play with a hooker when he had a fantasy loop in his head for a week.

But here was his Cuddy. The woman he always sparred with, vying for the spoils. And she was tired of demands on her time, her thoughts, her energy. And he was the perfect cathartic vehicle through which to channel all her desire for control. He was her uncontrollable House. And at this moment she was looking at him like Lewis and Clark looked at the New World… She would own this wildness.

"Cuddy," he said cautiously. "Just don't get ahead of yourself." She looked crazy, kneeling there between his legs, just biting her lip and staring at him. She was thinking of everything she could do to him, how to begin, how to end. "You look a little nuts… In a totally hot way, mind you."

"Why can't I decide what to do?" she asked, embarrassed.

House sighed. "Because it's totally up to you," he explained. "It's a foreign feeling for you."

"What are you talking about?" Cuddy asked. She'd always considered herself a pretty powerful woman. "I make more important decisions by lunch than most people made in a week."

"Well, I feel a little strange psychoanalyzing you while chained to a bed, but bear with me," he began. Cuddy nodded. She noticed how he scratched the top of his head while he thought, despite the handcuffs. God, she loved him. "So you have everything you want. The career. The child. Dare I say, me. And that's all fine and dandy. But all these things you want, also want things from you. Even, dare I say, me." He grinned at her. "And though you might want to do those things, maybe you don't want to do them exactly how and exactly when they want. But you do. You always do. The hospital wants you at a fundraiser on a night you'd rather watch shitty television in your underwear. You go to the fundraiser. Rachel wants to play with you when you'd rather be with me. In your underwear. You play. I want you in bed with me, _not_ in your underwear, when you'd rather be taking Rachel someplace fun. You get naked." Cuddy thought about what he was saying. She could think of dozens and dozens of moments like that. "And it isn't that you don't enjoy it – sometimes three or four times," he said with a wink, "But you rarely get to decide what _you_ want to do, right then."

She nodded again. "You're right."

"So right now, my demanding overbearing hands are incapacitated. Stop thinking about what you think I want to do, Cuddy." He gave her a sexy smirk. "What do you want to do?"

She smirked back.

"I mean maybe you _also_ want to sit on my face, which would be a happy coincidence…" he trailed off, laughing.

Cuddy crawled up his body and sat on his hips. She took her shirt off and threw it aside, watching House hungrily stare at her body. She saw his fingers involuntarily move in reaction to seeing her breasts. "I want to make you squirm." She reached behind her and took off her bra. House took a deep breath. "I want to make you moan." He licked his lips. "I want to make you say that I'm a better doctor than you." He narrowed his eyes.

"It'll never happen, woman."

"Oh, it'll happen," she teased. She slowly unbuttoned his shirt and opened it, kissing his chest and neck.

House enjoyed the sensation of her mouth on his skin, but steeled himself for battle. Cuddy ran her hands up his sides, then over his shackled arms.

"Lemme just double-check these," she teased, pretending to examine the manacles, but actually just pressing her breasts against his face. House seized the opportunity and closed his mouth over her nipple, using his tongue to make her gasp. Cuddy stayed there, enjoying it for a bit, before realizing she had lost focus. She sat up abruptly.

"Everything still secure up there?" he asked, pleased to have gotten the best of her already.

Cuddy said nothing, but bit her lip and watched his face while she unbuttoned his jeans, sliding them off. House didn't flinch. She pulled his boxers off. He still just met her eyes, but _something_ told her she was getting to him a little.

He knew what she was going to do, of course. The problem with being a man in this situation was the giant bull's eye that was his penis. It didn't take much insider knowledge to know how to drive him crazy. So this would have to be a mental game. He'd go somewhere else, pretend this wasn't happening, wonderful as it was, until she was unhooking him and begging to be taken. No way was he gonna call her the better doctor.

So he closed his eyes as he felt Cuddy's mouth on him. He couldn't help but let himself have pure enjoyment for a minute, but as soon as he felt that sneaky urge rising inside of him he began thinking about his last case, Wilson's dilemma about whether he got his hair cut too often, the time he got kicked in the nuts in little league. But Cuddy was a sneaky little devil. She started making noises. Noises like there was nothing better in the world than kissing him, licking him, like the very act was driving _her _to ecstasy. He couldn't block his ears and the tactile and auditory sensations would not allow him to focus on his distractions. _Fuck it, _he thought. He just decided to give in to it. He was breathing heavily and his hands kept periodically forgetting the game and trying to move down to touch her, creating a lovely metal-on-metal sound. "Cuddy," he gasped.

And then she was gone. Suddenly it was all coolness and breeze and Cuddy padding out of the room. "I need a drink of water," she called over her shoulder. "That Thai food was really salty." He could hear her giggle.

He just lay there and let out a huge moan. "You're evil. An evil, evil person!" he yelled.

"You're not as clever with the name-calling when all the blood's left your brain," she called back.

House whimpered. He felt a bizarre combination of self-pity and lust. All he wanted was her back in this room.

He got his wish and Cuddy came back in with her water. She straddled him, drank, then took an ice cube out and set her glass down. House watched with rapt attention as Cuddy slid the ice cube over her face, her neck, down her chest, over her breasts. She smirked at him because he couldn't even hold a poker face anymore. He was dumbstruck and staring with his mouth hanging open. His breath was shaking. Cuddy slid the ice down the taut plane of her stomach, pausing right at her heat for a moment, feeling the cool drips slide over her and onto House's belly. He sucked in air through his teeth. He closed his eyes, trying to get control of himself. He felt Cuddy slide the ice cube up his body, over his neck and chin to his lips. He took it in his mouth and Cuddy bent and kissed him, their tongues mingling around the cold rock between them. He was already so on edge, it was like a delicious punch to the stomach when Cuddy suddenly lowered herself onto him, their mouths still together. He took the ice cube in his teeth and Cuddy moved her jaw and neck over his mouth while she rode him. The cool rivulets that slid down her neck and splatted onto his chest juxtaposed with the heat of her sex around him. It was frying his brain.

Eventually the ice cube melted. Their cold mouths were furiously tasting each other. Cuddy could only be described as fucking the fucking fuck out of him. He grit his teeth. He moaned. He got dents in his wrists from the incessant need to grab her.

Then she stopped. She rolled off of him onto the bed.

House clenched his eyes shut and gave a frustrated groan. "You're a better doctor than me, Cuddy!" he shouted, laughing a little.

"I want an example," she demanded, also laughing.

"Every day," he said, banging his head on the pillow and talking fast because he was so hot for her he thought he might pass out. "Every day you give a shit about if people live or die when I just want to poke around and solve my puzzle! _You_ make _me_ better because _you're_ my caring!" He rambled on while he pictured how it would feel to just be inside her again. But she was silent, frozen.

He opened his eyes. "What's wrong?" She smacked his chest.

"Here I was all ready to just animalistically fuck you, and you gotta go and get all mushy on me, House. Now I feel all tender." She was smiling, moved by what he'd shouted.

"Forget it!" he shouted. "Go back. You're a shitty doctor. Go back to animalistic fucking!"

She laughed. She turned around, straddling him the other way. She rose and guided him inside of her again. House was mesmerized. He watched the muscles of her back as she moved, her long brown curls spilling down her shoulders. He felt thrilled to be back to it, and turned on by the unusual – for them – position. He wanted to reach out, hold her hips, caress her waist, but he couldn't. Poor guy just had to lie there and get ridden by Cuddy. She moved in different ways, changing her pace, changing her angle, and he was fascinated at this glimpse into her own selfish desires. She was just getting herself off, on him. He felt awesomely objectified.

Suddenly, Cuddy cried out and flopped forward onto her elbows and he got a perfect view of her ass. He was incredibly happy to feel her body tensing around his because after all that, this was it. He was done for. He fell into bliss, his fingers clutching bedposts, while Cuddy continued pushing down on him, her own orgasm causing her to move around him with abandon.

The ecstasy blew their minds and they lay there gasping and trembling for a few minutes. Eventually Cuddy clambered up to lie next to him, kissing his cheek while he sprawled there, still panting. "It's called 'reverse cowgirl,'" she teased.

"I know what it's called," he assured her. "Why the hell have we not done it before?"

Cuddy swallowed. "I always thought it would bother you because I could see your leg."

He gave her a disgusted look. "Fuck my leg, Cuddy." She laughed. "No, I'm serious. Fuck it. Do whatever the hell you want to my leg. It's you, I don't care."

"Well, I did. I did exactly what I wanted." She nestled against him.

House kissed her head. "Good." He looked at the clock on the bedside table. "12:04. No longer your birthday. It's all about me again. Now unlock me so I can get a drink of water and then do exactly what _I_ want."

[H] [H] [H]

Four days later, Cuddy took advantage of her gift. She had two hours before she needed to get Rachel, she'd had four arguments that day (two with House about his patient) and she was prepared to sneak to her bathroom refuge.

But instead she walked two blocks to her new sanctuary. She felt nervous as she unlocked the street level door, like she was breaking in. She climbed the stairs and outside the apartment entrance there was a pink pastry box from the café, tied with a white string. A beautifully calligraphied note on top read "What kind of croissant do you want today, Cuddy?" She laughed, scooped up the box and went inside. She opened the box to find six different croissants inside.

Cuddy ate a chocolate one, lying on a couch and alternating between reading a novel and staring out the window at sky and tree. After an hour she went downstairs and popped into the café to pick up a coffee before getting Rachel. The cute teenager was working and smiled at her in a conspiratorial way. Cuddy smiled back. "How did he know I was coming today?" she asked her in a hushed voice.

"What do you mean?" the girl asked.

"The pastries. The croissants. When did he call to have them sent up?"

The girl laughed a little, then stopped herself and said nothing.

"What is it?"Cuddy probed.

The girl handed Cuddy her coffee. "We send them up every day," she told her. "If you don't come, we get the old ones when we bring the new ones."

"Are you serious?" The girl nodded. "The little note? Every day?" She nodded again.

Cuddy stood there agog. The teenager tucked her hair behind her ears and smiled at her.

"I think he likes you," she whispered.


End file.
